I've been thinking about the e-mail message recently making the rounds that solicits chapters for successor books to Google and Libraries (aka Internet Reference Services Quarterly Vol. 10, No. 3/4). One of these books will focus on Google Scholar and Google Print, and the other will focuse on other Google offerings.

As I've been thinking about this, I've also taken a look at some of the technology books in my library's collection on NetLibrary. The SUNYConnect project, which funded the SUNY-wide collection, was unable to purchase any new titles since the intial purchase in the late 1990s. As a result, our collection in this and other areas is out of date. This is reflected in the decreased use of the collection.

In these days of many options in Web publishing, one has to wonder about the wisdom of using the static monograph or journal format for publishing on topics characterized by rapid change. So it strikes me that writing anything about Google and putting it in static format is not the best idea. These new books/journal issues might be useful for a while, but eventually they will become historical artifacts.

Now, obviously there is nothing inherently wrong with historical artifacts. But I doubt that articles or books about Google will be terribly useful for very long. Google is one of the fastest-changing companies around. Keeping current on its offerings requires frequent updating of anything written about them.

A current and accurate publication - isn't this what we should expect from a new journal issue or book? If newness is already fading by the time something comes out, how are we to move beyond the snapshot effect?

This may not be a new problem, but there is a new-ish solution out there: wikis.

If the new publications devoted to Google were hosted on wikis, we would have the best of both worlds: new content to reflect current information, and a history of revisions so that the older writings are accessible, too. With only the designated authors allowed to edit content, the Wikipedia problem of uncertain expertise is eliminated.

Three primary questions immediately come to mind.

1. What would be the financial model for publishers?
2. What would be the publishers' approach to the preservation of the material in this format?
3. What can be reasonably expected of authors for keeping the material current?

I'm wondering if there are any self-published examples out there that are leading the way.